144 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE
- Governing international financial support for biodiversity conservation,
- The identification of international conservation priorities and
- Technology transfer for conservation and use of biodiversity.
(iv) Agenda 21
Developed through a series of inter-Governmental preparatory meetings with input from
a variety of non-Governmental processes including the Biodiversity Strategy Programme—
AGENDA 21 provides a plan of action on a number of issues including biodiversity.
INDIA AS A MEGA-DIVERSITY NATION
Lying at the junction of Agro-tropical, Euro-Asian and the Indo-Malayan biogeography
realms, India is a country of vast biodiversity in the world and quite a significant one all
over the globe. In fact, it is among the twelve “Mega diversity” countries in the world. India
is also a “Vavilov” centre of high crop genetic diversity–so named after the Russian agro
botanist N.I. Vavilov who identified about eight such centres around the world in the 1950s.
India, a mega-biodiversity country, while following the path of development, has been
sensitive to the needs of conservation. India’s strategies for conservation and sustainable
utilization of biodiversity in the past aimed at providing special status and protection to
biodiversity rich areas by declaring them as national parks. Wildlife sanctuaries, biosphere
reserves, ecologically fragile and sensitive areas. It has helped in reducing pressure from
reserve forests by alternative measures of fuel wood and fodder need satisfaction. by a
forestation of degraded areas and wastelands, creation of ex-suit conservation facilities such
as gene banks and eco-development. The challenges before India are not only to sustain the
efforts of the past but also further add to these efforts by involving people in the mission.
BIODIVERSITY ASSESSMENT: INITIATIVES IN INDIA
In a most recent attempt to map biogeographically regions, Rodgers and Pan war (1988)
attempted to define the biogeographically regions of India. The sub-continent has ten
biogeographically zones viz., Trans-Himalayan, Himalayan, Indian desert, Semi-Arid, Western
Ghats, Deccan Peninsula, Gangetic Plains, North East India, Islands and Coasts and not yet
defined zones for aquatic (freshwater and marine) ecosystems have been mapped. The Wildlife
Institute of India has converted these regions on Survey of India digital database.
India is rich in endemic flora and fauna. According to an estimate (Anon., 1983) about
30 per cent plant species are endemic to India. Areas rich in endemism are North Eastern
India, the Western Ghats and the North Western Himalayas. A small pocket of -local
endemism is also reported from Eastern Ghats (MacKinnon and MacKinnon, 1986). The
Project on Study, Survey and Conservation of Elidangered Plants (POSSCEF) has estimated
that about 3000-4000 plant species are under different degrees of threat (Nayar & Shastri,
1987). Recently, Ministry of Environment and Forests, Government of India has launched
a project viz., National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan (NBSAP) which envisages the
assessment and stock taking of biodiversity related information at various levels, including
distribution of endemic and endangered species and site-specific threats. Key features of
this project include emphasis on decentralized planning and use of interdisciplinary working
groups to involve all sectors concerned with biodiversity conservation.